To: skunk-works
Subject: skunk-works "From RAINBOW to GUSTO: Stealth and the Design of the
Lockheed Blackbird"
Hi, everyone.
I thought that some of the folks here might be interested in my book,
which AIAA is publishing at the end of the month. It's the story of
early work in stealth and how it influenced the design of the
Blackbird. I was able to interview many of the Lockheed and Lincoln
Lab/SEI folks, and even Bob Widmer (Kelly Johnson's counterpart at
Convair) and Leo Geary. There are previously unpublished drawings and
photos, including Lockheed's four subsonic stealthy designs from
1957, the two major versions of FISH, desk models of five Kingfish
designs, the Navy inflatable aircraft designs, Lockheed's versions of
FISH, and all but two of Lockheed's Archangel series. There are also
lots of Kelly Johnson's rough sketches.
And, of course, it covers the evolution of various RCS reduction
techniques.
Finally, AIAA will be putting on line my collection of declassified
documents, although not the drawings and photos.
http://www.aiaa.org/content.cfm?pageid=360&id=1789
And many thanks to Jay Miller for his help, encouragement, and
friendship during the many years that it took to bring this project to
fruition.
Cheers,
Paul
===============
Paul A. Suhler
suhler@ieee.org
